


CMO 






COMPULSORY EDUCATION 



AND ITS RELATIONS TO THE 



DEFECTIVE CLASSES 



-BY— 



HENRY W. ROTHERT, 



SUPERINTENDENT OF THE 



Iowa School for the Deaf. 



IOWA SCHOOL FOR THE DEAF PRESS 
COUKCIL BLUFFS. 
1904, 



."1?7 



D. of D. 
MAY 23 1917 



i 

i 



COMPULSORY EDUCATION 



AND ITS RELATIONS TO THE 



DEFECTIVE CLASSES 



COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 
And Its Relations to the Defective Classes. 



le Deaf. 



By Henry W, Rothert, Superiiitendeat of tlie Iowa Sclinol for tl 

A paper read at a (Quarterly Coiifereiice of Board of Control and 
SuDerint.endeuts at I)es Moines. 

"What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a 
human soul, the saint and the hero, the wise, the good and 
the orreat man very often lie hid and concealed in a plebeian, 
which a proper education might have disintered and brought 
to light," — Addison. 

"Whatever you would have appear in a nation's life that 
you must put into its school." An old German motto — There- 
fore the foundation of public education is broad statesman- 
ship and not charity. 

The recognition of the arbitrary demands of a 'nation's 
prosperity, growth and freedom rests with the education and 
intelligence of its citizenship. 

It is not charity to educate any child no matter where — no 
matter what. It is duty, an obligation and a self-preserva- 
tion. 

The scintillations of an individual's sympathetic interest in 
another's w^eal should not be confounded with the stern in- 
flexible duty of a people's self protection. 

True, the material may not be the same, the stones as taken 
from the quarry may be of diiferent shape, the impressions 
made by the mechanic may vary, yet a structure can be built 
of sufficient strength to serve as a shield from the encroach- 
ments of ignorance and conse(iuent vice. This structure 
must be erected at i)ublic expense. 

Our progressive enlightening civilization demands this, as 
far as it ai)pertains to the normal child as a duty, no longer 
prompted by admonitions of benevolence or compassion, while 
as to the other child which may not be gifted with all of the 
five God-given senses there still remains a disposition to con- 



2 COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 

strue all le^^al re(iuirements and offered opportunities as the 
result of g-enerous charity. Certainly what concerns the 
education, in its broadest sense, of the normal child should 
pertain as far as it is applicable to the defective child. 

Therefore, in a measure at least, the causes which lead up 
to, the motives which prompt, the underlying^ principles 
which g-overn, the arguments in favor of, and the results at- 
tained by Compulsory Education are (or should be ), the same 
in the one case as in the other. 

Compulsory' Education has been recog-nized by statutory 
enactments in 32 states of the Union, while its principles are 
incorporated into law in many countries of P^urope. 

Its mandator^' provisions touch the responsibility of the 
parent to his prog^eny and to the communit}- at largfe, protects 
the child as to its own inherent rig-hts as a human being: 
under common care, secures immunity from the enfeebling 
results of child labor, and provides safe-gfuards against the 
vicious and deplorable consequences of non-attendance and 
truancy, by the establishment of Parental schools. Ungraded 
schools, Truant schools, and Industrial schools. In this 
country prominent educators have for many years been en- 
gaged in recommending and fostering* this so desirable, so 
necessary ordinance as a part of our beneficent public school 
system and have been measurably aided and enourag-ed by 
the good women and the g-ood mothers of the land. Permis- 
sible therefore are references to opinions expressed in sup- 
port of Compulsory Education by those who are so closely 
connected with the cause of the mental and physical train- 
ing" of the ignorant and dependent child. 

"While we are steadily gaining- for our public schools the 
support of those who are opposed or indifferent to them, we 
signally fail to impress that class of people who throug^h self- 
interest, carelessness, or ignorance, ignore the claims of their 
children to the rights and benefits of at least a common 
school education. ^J\) the (juestion ''What is the remedy?" 
the reply is "Admitted that education forms the only secure 
foundation and bulwark of a republican form of government, 
if not of every form of government; admitted that the univer- 
sality of education l)ecomes thus of vital importance to the 
state, and admitted that the exigencies of the case not only 



COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 3 

empower, but compel, the state to provide all facilities neces- 
sary to enable ever3^ child to acquire at least a common school 
education and we are forced to the conclusion that it is not 
only the privileg-e but the dut3^ of the state to compel every 
parent to bestow upon his children, at least the education 
which the state places within his reach," 

"In the uneducated youth and the thousands of adults who 
cannot write their own names we have a stratum of ig-norance 
and its concomitants underneath our social structure, that 
seems to threaten the whole with decay. It is in this soil that 
crime and penury g-row, from this field comes that dreadful 
crop that is harvested in poor houses, houses of refug-e, jails 
and penitentiaries. This is the deepest stain on our free 
institutions. Should not this illiteracy be prevented? Can 
not these neg-lected children be reclaimed? 

"Firmly believing- in the necessity of a g-overnment estab- 
lished upon a basis like our own, w^hy hesitate to incorporate 
the principles of compulsory attendance into the pubic school 
system of every state in the union? Those who own the 
property are taxed for the support of public schools for the 
benefit of all children alike. The poor as well as the rich en- 
joy the advantages of schools supported by the tax fund. 
Shall the intemperate, the indolent, the thriftless who do not 
contribute to the general welfare and 3^et receive protection 
and enjoy privileges, being in a minority, be allowed to trans- 
mit their ignorance through their children, prevent the 
successful operation of law and thus defeat the will of the 
majority upon a question interwoven with our higher interests 
and our very free existence? The priceless boon of a free 
school is of incalculably more importance to the non-tax-pa^^- 
ers than to an^' other class. If a state in its rig-hts as such for 
high, moral and political reasons can justly coerce the property 
holders into the support of universal free education; if it can 
regulate the labor-department in our manufacturing estab- 
lishments and in our mines by a stringent law, can it not, — 
yea ought it not — for every reason to insist that the children 
for whom such ample provisions are made shall avail them- 
selves of the proffered opportunities for their education? 

"It would seem logical that, if anv state claims the right to 



4 COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 

tax the childless man to furnish a fund to educate other 
people's children it holds in its hands the corresponding- 
rig-ht to compel those people to utilize the fund in the im- 
provement of those who, ignorant as well as learned, are the 
born heirs to all the franchises of citizenship. A system of 
free public schools is not maintained b}- the state merelj^ to 
confer a benefit upon an individual or a class but engag-es in 
the work of popular education for her own protection, as a 
fundamental civil duty, and cannot afford to be indifferent as 
to whether or not her citizens avail themselves of the civic 
advantages afforded b}^ her munificent patronage of public 
schools, and public institutions. While it is a duty to place 
education within the reach of all the people, it is a farther 
dut}^ to compel them to avail themselves of its benefits. An 
elementary education should be considered as much a legal 
obligation as it is a necessity, and there is no more question 
as to the power to enforce it, than there is for the authority 
to enact anj^ other law to promote the public welfare. 

"Compulsory- attendance in our schools and educational 
institutions is no hardship (with free text books ) but a just 
and wise measure to protect societj^ and perpetuate enlight- 
ened self-government. A parent no matter how straitened 
in circumstances does a child a great injustice who prevents 
a thorough training in youth for the battle of life. What is a 
dollar saved or earned to-daj- by forcing immature intellects 
and bodies into the "bread winning acts" if the whole after 
life of that child is marred and cramped by reason of that 
forcing? Thorough preparation in youth is the onlj- economy 
of time in life work and if parents do not realize this, the state 
must and should compel every child according to ability to 
secure the necessary training for industrious, successful and 
intelligent living." 

In every community there are parents who are wholly in- 
different to the advantages of education^ who will not permit 
their children to avail themselves of opportunities offered, 
who wilfully refuse to send their children to school under the 
belief that "a little learning is a dangerous thing," or who 
want "only meat and bread" secured by the muscle of the 
child in order that they many rest in ignorance and indolence. 



COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 5 

Such parents, so remiss in their duties to their offspring- 
should be made sensible, should be forced to be industrious 
and compelled to discharge a parent's duty. With this class 
of parents the child is but a tool to their selfish sinful greed. 

"If the state is justifiable in providing at publice expense 
for the education of children for its own protection it is also 
justifiable in protecting the rights of children to be educated 
for its own protection." 

We beg to insert a clipping from the public press bearing" 
upon this subject. 

HAS thp: child no rights? 

"A sad and pitiable scene was witnessed here last 

week at a preliminary trial in the court house, in 

which a little girl eight or nine year old was a 

witness. It developed in the examination that she 

could neither read nor write, had never been to 

school, or to Sabbath school, had never heard a 

pra^^er offered, did not know until that morning that 

there was a God — and this in a country where 

churches and free schools dotted every hillside. 

Could the condition of this child, have been any worse 

in heathendom? Almost within sight of churches 

and schools is a child who might have been in 

^'Darkest Africa" as far as any benefit to her is 

concerned." 

And 3 et we are told the law must not interfere with the 

right of a father to control his children. What right has this 

father to rear his child in this way? What right has he to 

disregard the claims of society upon him to rear his children 

for useful and honorable womanhood and manhood? Has not 

the state a paramount right to see that he does regard the 

claims of the community* in which he lives or in which his 

children may hereafter live? Has not the child itself some 

rights in the premises which the state is bound to protect it in, 

even from an indifferent and careless father? Has he a right 

to ignore the inborn right of his child to health, happiness, 

and intelligence? Never. 

After perusal of above it is refreshing to say the least to 
read the title of the act establishing Compulsory Education 



() COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 

in our sister state Missouri. "An Act to enforce the consti- 
tutional rights of every child in the state to an education." 

''To bring: up such a child in i^jfnorance is a crime and 
should be treated as such.'' I^i^norance is the most proliiic 
source of criminality and should be under the ban of leg-al 
punishment. The parents may object, claiming- this inter- 
feres with their liberties, it oug^ht, -when they are incapaci- 
tated by vice or other causes from the performance of essen- 
tial duties as parents. Others may claim 'It arrog-ates new 
power by the g-overnment." So do all quarantine and hyg-i- 
enic reg-ulations and laws for the abatement of nuisances in 
time of pestilence. Ig-norance is as noxious as the most offen- 
sive nuisance and more destructive than bodlily contagion. 
Ag-ain others assert compulsory attendance laws are un- 
American and unadapted to our free institutions and laws inas- 
much as they authorize the drag-g-ing- (so called ) of children 
to school. Better this than drag-g-ing- them to jail a few^ years 
hence. 

The responsibility of parents as recog-nized by law in diff- 
erent parts of the United States is established by fines and 
imprisonment varj'ing- in amount and leng-th, from a fine of 
$1.00 to $5.00 in Pennsylvania to from $50.00 to $200. 00 in 
Nevada. Imprisonment not exceedingf 10 days in New- 
Mexico, to not exceeding- three months in New^ Jersey. 

In certain foreig-n countries also, absence of children from 
school is accounted a transg^ression of parents and penalties 
inflicted covering- fines of 10 cents to $2.00 in Italy to a maxi- 
mum fine of $25.00, in Queensland, or imprisonment of 4 hours 
in Switzerland to a maximum of 14 days in Scotland. 

In this country the ag:e at which the child's attendance at 
school in the several states is retiuired is fixed at six 3-ears 
as the lowest and l(^ years as the higfhest-while in Europe 
the regfulation embraces a variation of from 4 years to 14 
years. 

With us the time of attendance necessary to comply with 
the law in our country lies within the boundary of 8 to 20 con- 
secutive weeks. In Europe, in some countries, the term is 
indefmite such as "Until scholars shall have attained a certain 
proficiency in relig^ion, reading-, writing: and arithmetic" while 



COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 7 

in others there is a definite time rang-ing- from 12 weeks in 
Norway to every school day or the entire period of school in 
England and in southern Germany. 

In our own state Compulsory EMu cation was legally recog- 
nized by the law going into effect July 4th last. Great cred- 
it is due Hon. W. L. Eaton, Speaker of the House of Repre- 
sentatives, Hon. Geo.W. Dunham, Chairman of the committee 
on schools and other members of the 29th Gen. Assembly for 
their zealous, persistent successful advocac}' of a measure so 
far reaching in its requirements a.nd so promising as to its 
beneficial results. Grateful acknowledgements should also 
be accorded the State Teachers' Association for its emphatic 
recommendation of compulsory attendance, and to the Feder- 
ation of Women's Clubs in Iowa for the willing helpful assist- 
ance of its members. The provisions of the law are somewhat 
similar to those of other states, directing that — "Any person 
having control of any child of the age of seven to fourteen 
years inclusive in proper physical and mental condition to at- 
tend school, shall cause such child to attend some public, pri- 
vate or parochial school where the common school branches 
of reading, writing, spelling, arithmetic, grammar, geogra- 
phy, physiology and United States history are taught, or to 
attend equivalent instruction by a competent teacher else- 
where than school, for at least twelve consecutive weeks in 
each school year." Exception is made in so far as that the 
law shall not apply to any child who lives more than two 
miles from any school, by the nearest travelled- road, except 
in those districts in which the pupils are transported at 
public expense, or are excused for sufficient reason by any 
court of record or judge thereof. 

Any person violating these provisions shall be deemed 
guilty of a misdem.eanor, and upon ccmviction pay a fine of 
not less than three dollars and not more than twenty dollars. 
Authority is also granted to Boards of Directors to establish 
Truant Schools, or set apart separate rooms in any public 
school building for the instruction of children who are habit- 
ually truant and provide for their confinement and mainten- 
ance. In case any child placed in such Truant Schools 
proves insubordinate or escapes or be habitually vagrant, 



8 COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 

disorderly or incorrigible, commitment may follow to the 
Industrial Schools of the State. Appointment of Truant 
officers is provided for and their duties and the duties of 
directors of school districts for the enforcement of the law- 
prescribed. Census officers are empowered to ascertain the 
number of children of the ages of seven to fourteen in their 
respective districts, the number of such children who do not 
attend school, and so far as possible the cause of failure of 
such non-attendance. 

In addition to all of all this the law provides a system of 
checks by w^hich it can be quickly ascertained whether a 
given child is attending any school. On demand and at least 
once a year, the head of each parochial or private school is to 
furnish the secretary a report of the names, ages, and attend- 
ance of all of the pupils in the school; this report is filed by 
the secretary for reference. Reports on any individual pupil 
may be called for at any time. Parents with children in 
private schools shall furnish the secretary a certificate to 
that effect on demand. 

The law is not as broad and extending as it might be, not 
covering all cases of voluntary or enforced absenteeism, nor 
is it as definite in its coercive restrictions as its most ardent 
friends would desire. It must be regarded as the pioneer 
measure, recognizing and incorporating into our statutesthe 
principles of Compulsory Education. 
j In its enforcement, errors, omissions and imperfections 
will be discovered and the same remedied, inserted or re- 
moved by future legislation. 

The term "proper mental and physical condition" should 
be modified and qualified. It is here that the line of dis- 
tinction is drawn. These words form the verdict which 
sends the normal child to the opening portals of enlightening 
education, while it .commits the defective child to within 
prison bars of debasing ignorance. 

The more favored brother and sister by the strong arm 
of the law are removed from careless indifferent supervision, 
while the less favored, having no legal rights, are compelled 
to remain where no authority can reach, no hiw ])rotect. 

The child who through sickness, accident or inheritance 



COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 9 

wanders in mental darkness, or who in visionless apathy ex- 
periences only its animal cravings, or who isolated and alone 
is bej^ond the reach of the human voice is certainly entitled 
to legal protection, to legal assistance. 

The mental germ can be stimulated and developed, the 
morbid apathy of a sightless soul changed to an intelligent 
realization of a spiritual existence, and the cheerless isolation 
dissolved into conditions surrounding a social, intellectual and 
moral being. 

True the developing processes are different, and certain 
temporarj^ or permanent physical deficiencies may debar the 
attendance of a defective child, at what is commonly termed 
the public school, j^et, recognizing the rights of this class, as 
well as protecting the community at large, the state has 
erected and is maintaining institutions and schools in which 
special methods for their betterment, improvement and edu- 
cation are practiced. The doors of these institutions and 
schools are open and room provided for all. Why not com- 
pel the attendance of every child ready to enter? 

Wh}' exempt from the operations of a beneficent law a 
class for whom compulsory attendance means more by far 
than it does for the majority? 

With ignorant and vicious parents it is the defective child 
which is made the target of outbursts of temper and passion, 
which is chained down to the menial servitude of exacting 
drudger^^ and which, when by animal instinct it escapes 
from the cutting stings of the parental lash, becomes a prey 
in the outer world to immorality, vice and crime. 

But there is another class of parents far different in type 
and disposition, whom no intelligent appeal will influence, no 
picture of the darkened future of their child attract, who 
are guided only by their emotions and whom only the en- 
forced requirement of such a law can reach. Actuated by 
parental love, centering their affections upon the defective 
child, separation from it is nigh to saying "good-b3^e for ever.'' 

Years come and go and that darling child is retained at 
home, growing up in comparative ignorance, to be in after life 
a shame and a curse to that weak yet loving household. 
Strange as this may appear, many such cases come under the 



10 COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 

observation of those connected with institutions for the de- 
fective youth. 

At the opening" of our school this year a deaf boy 10 years 
of ag"e was broug-ht from a distant part of the state by his 
father who had thus been prevailed upon by neighbors and by 
the minister of his church. Remaining with us a day, and 
returning the following day, he sought and received all per- 
tinent information, visited school rooms, dining- room and dor- 
mitories, conversed freely with officers and teachers and be- 
came so satisfied and impressed that he thanked God such a 
school existed within the boundaries of Iowa. The boy was 
duly enrolled, sent to his class and was contented. 

But when the parting hour arrived, the dread of separation 
overshadowed the father's judgment and tenacitly holding 
his boy by the hand, with tears g-ushing forth profusely he 
said. "It is all right but I cannot leave him, I must take him 
home again." He left with his boy. For that father a com- 
pulsory law is humane, for that boy a right. 

There is yet another class of homes, so called, at the hearth- 
stone of which stands the destitute defective child in utter 
desolation and helplessness. 

It is where the illiterate foreign immigrant has his abode 
and rears his children. A stranger to our customs and insti- 
tutions, shiftless and careless as to the future, governed 
solely by self, he pays no heed to the conditions of his ever 
increasing family save and except when the members thereof 
can contribute to his own desires, gratifj^ his own appetite 
and provide for his selfish indolence and comfort. 

His feeble minded, blind or deaf child is as rubbish in that 
unholy hovel, treated as unclean and as an interference, as 
the whims of superstition or the wiles of debauchery may 
prompt. 

Should not the law in its majesty interfere and wrest from 
the clutches of such degrading influences and surroundings 
the innocent though defective, the poor but human child? 

In passing may we express the hope that the measure, now 
pending before congress to debar all illiterates from enter- 
ing our country, be speedily passed and approved. 

Not so with the intelligent foreigner who seeks in a free 



COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 11 

country the future happiness and welfare of his children. 
He soon identifies himself with church and school, perhaps 
that church in which he can worship according- to the dictates 
t)f his own conscience and that school that is presided over by 
his own countrymen, and yet even with many of these there 
is an unwarranted disposition to retain the defective child at 
home, either by reason of ig-norance as to the blessing-s ex- 
tended by our public institutions, or throug-h fear the child 
(as partlj^ at least in case of the deaf) would acquire a lan- 
guage different from its mother tongue. 

To all such a compulsory law would be no hardship, on 
the contrarj^ by the machinery of its enforcement a knowl- 
edge of the advantag-es and results of methods and training 
for the defective classes would be broug-ht to their own, yea 
to every fireside. The information so transmitted would be 
accomplished bj^ the mandatory order to avail themselves of 
the opportunities offered and provided for. 

Concerning- admission to the Institution for Feeble-minded 
Children, the org-anic law provides "every child and youth 
residing- within the state, between the ages of five and 
twenty-one, who by reasons of deficient intellect is rendered 
unable to acquire an education in the common schools is en- 
titled to receive the physical and mental training- and care of 
this institution at the expense of the state." 

The wording should be changed so as to read in substance 
"every child, etc., etc., must receive physical and mental 
training at this institution or elsewhere at the expense of the 
state or at the cost of the person responsible for said child 
or youth." 

Why compel the taxpayers of Iowa to establish and main- 
tain an institution, the advantages of which can be accepted 
or rejected according to the inclination or whims of a small 
minority of its population? 

Why not protect the property holder in his forced invest- 
ment and reimburse him by the return of interest in relief 
and protection? 

Relief as to the daily observance of and occasional contact 
with the so-called "lower grades" and protection from the 
irresponsible acts and possible irregularities of the immature 



12 COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 

and undeveloped at the time and in the future. 

And as to the child, let the mandatory power of the state 
extend over this defenceless, unfortunate one, superceding 
the authoritjT^ of the parent, and vouchsafing- a chance at least 
for a possible release from the bondage restraining its im- 
prisoned soul and in accordance with a more than human 
mandate, — -"Inasmuch as you have done it unto one of the 
least of these, you have done it unto me." 

The law establishing and making provisions for the govern- 
ment and maintenance of the College for the Blind recognizes 
the right of these sightless children to an education at the 
expense of the state. With this class no mental deficiency 
retards the developing processes, the germ of intelligence 
rests with the blind as with the seeing and they are as re- 
sponsive to intellectual training as their more fortunate 
brothers and sisters. 

The fact that there are comparatively few in any commu- 
nity cannot be urged as a reason why a compulsory attend- 
ance law should not be made applicable to them. If "Educa- 
tion is in the highest sense the charge of political society, 
an important agency for the promotion of morals and an as- 
surance for continued progress, for everything that is wise 
and beneficent in our present civilization," then society in 
organized government should see to it, that no exemptions 
whatever be permitted and that no local influence of any kind 
deprive Sinj child of the opportunities offered. 

Providing opportunities and not compelling their accept- 
ance is like tilling the soil and not putting in tiie seed. 

Education is a greater boon for the deaf than for perhaps 
any other class of children. Totally debarred from inter- 
course with the speaking world by reason of his want of 
means of communication in infanc^^ and early 3^outh, he 
pleadingly follows in anxious but mute expectany or obedi- 
ence the awkward gestures and facial contortions of his kin- 
dred. His mental faculties implanted by an all-wise Provi- 
dence lie dormant by reason of the unyielding crust sur- 
rounding, and unless relieved he is condemned to a helpless 
life of mental inactivity and silent hopeless seclusion. But 
when the crust is broken, an avenue to reach his inner soul 



COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 13 

provided, when means are placed at his command by which 
he can receive the impressions of a dawning- intelligence, he 
readily extends his receptive condition, and soon casts off 
the shell of ig-norance and darkness, assuming his rig-htful 
position as a youth in pursuit of knowledg-e and consequent 
happiness. 

His defect (want pf hearing") is no longer a bar to his mental 
development, and entering the race with his normal contem- 
poraries he presses steadily forward and onward reaching 
the goal at the same place while perhaps not in the same time. 
After which, engaging in the avocations of daih^ life, sur- 
rounding himself with the comforts of a happy home, accept- 
ed in intelligent society and endowed with the priceless in- 
heritance of American Citizenship he becomes the peer and 
equal of his fellow men. Should such a child with such a 
future be restricted and restrained by reason of the indiffer- 
ence, ignorance, greed or sentiment of its parent? 

In many of the European countries where the principles of 
Compulsory Education obtain, its sheltering folds are extend- 
ed over the defective and the normal child alike. In our 
country but few states of the Union have recognized either 
the rights of the defective child or the community in which 
it lives or may live by authoritatively requiring his or her at- 
tendance at schools erected and maintained for their improve- 
ment and betterment. If the writer is correctly informed 
there is upon the statute looks of only three states a compul- 
sory law for the Deaf. It may be pertinent at the ending for 
the purposes of this paper to quote from one of these, the 
Oregon Law as follows: 

"Whereas the State has provided an institution for the 
free instruction of all resident deafmute children of lawful 
school age, everj^ parent, guardian or person having control 
of any child or children afflicted with deafness, shall be 
required under the penalties here in after specified, to send 
such child or children to said institution for a period of not 
less than six (6) months of each year between the ages of 
eight and sixteen years, unless children be taught in a private 
school, etc., etc." 



14 COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 

There being- no law compelling- and requiring- that deaf- 
mutes attend the deafmute school, and it being- for the best 
interests of the people of the State that these children should 
be properly educated this act shall take effect and be in full 
force from and after its approval by the Governor.'^ 

[NoTK^Approved, February, 1891.] 

In conclusion maj^ I express the hope that these footprints 
thus clearly defined upon the g-olden shore of the Pacific 
Ocean, may erelong- also be found upon the fertile prairies of 
Iowa — and that justice holding- the scales with impartial 
hands will secure an equal poise as between the necessities 
of those endowed with a full measure of human senses, and 
the needs of those who thoug-h less favored by the possibl- 
ities of their future, add weig-ht and consideration. 

[NoTK— Quotations in tliis paper are from 
the Report of the Commissioner of Education. 



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